


The Ice Box Job

by misura



Category: The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Abandoned Work - Unfinished and Discontinued, Alternate Universe - Criminals, Community: avland, Multi, POV Alternating, Pre-Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-25
Updated: 2014-08-15
Packaged: 2017-12-21 08:11:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,661
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/897974
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/misura/pseuds/misura
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Or: how Tony, Natasha and Clint ended up stealing Captain America. (criminals!AU)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Русский available: [Дело о холодильнике](https://archiveofourown.org/works/2124765) by [Helga Winter (hwinter)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hwinter/pseuds/Helga%20Winter)
  * Translation into Русский available: [Дело о консервной банке](https://archiveofourown.org/works/2164170) by [Helga Winter (hwinter)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hwinter/pseuds/Helga%20Winter)



> written for Challenge 17 (Out of Place) of avland, wherein I got a random AU to play with

_The heist of the century,_ Tony had called it, before. The job to end all other jobs.

Natasha had called it _a complicated way of committing suicide_ , but then Tony had made his 'I am a rogue-ish billionaire-slash-hacker-slash-technological-wizard-slash-miracle-engineer' face - not at her, of course, Natasha wasn't susceptible to things like that.

Clint was, though.

 _Sounds like fun,_ he'd said, and then, before Natasha could talk him out of it: _I'm in._

And that was that.

 

SHIELD would know what'd hit them, of course, but if all went according to plan, they'd find out just a little bit too late to be able to actually do anything about it.

"Except froth at the mouth," Tony said, swirling a drink the way people who owned private planes always seemed to do. "I anticipate a great deal of frothing at the mouth."

" 'Target: one crate, contents unknown'," Natasha read out loud.

Clint wondered if she realized that they'd both arrived at a point where they no longer checked on these sorts of things _before_ taking the job.

"The kind of security they're throwing at that thing, it's gotta be something good," Tony said.

"Good for them doesn't necessarily mean good for us," Clint commented.

"It's mysterious, it's valuable, they have it, I want it," Tony said.

"Simple as that."

Tony beamed at him. "Simple as that."

*

"What do you mean: it's a guy?" Tony yel- _spoke very calmly_ into his earpiece. "It can't be a guy - that would be, I don't know, illegal?"

"Secret government facility," Natasha said succinctly. According to Tony's monitors, she was on the second floor and facing three armed guards, so he figured now was not the time to get into a round of witty banter about the sorts of things one might reasonably expect to find in secret government facilities.

"Yeah," Tony said. "Okay. But - "

"Not an android," Clint said. "He bleeds. It's real blood."

"What do you mean: he bleeds?" Tony screa- _asked casually_. "Did you cut him? Is that what we do now: hop around the world cutting people?"

"It seemed the easiest way to find out."

It probably had been. Still: "Well, don't do it again. Think of our reputation. More importantly: think of _my_ reputation."

"So do I bring him in?" Clint asked. "He's kind of heavy."

"They were keeping him in a _crate_ ," Tony said. "What do you think?"

"Ice box, sort of," Clint said. "Could have been something medical. I don't know; I'm not an expert."

"Exactly." Tony glanced at the security cameras that were still under his control. SHIELD's security system was definitely AU - Artificially Unintelligent, but it had enough power to put up a fight, and he needed JARVIS for other things as well. "Bring him. He wakes up sick, we can always give him back."

"Stark," Natasha said. "He might wake up dead."

"Too much horror at movie night," Tony said. "Knew it would get to you some day. Now, repeat after me: zombies aren't real. But if it makes you feel any better, no worries, I've got a bottle of holy water right here."

"You know, just because it _looks_ like water ... "

"Less talking, more getting your butt back to base, please," Tony said. "By which I refer to Clint, obviously, as I would never be so indelicate as to refer to a lady's lovely rear-end by such a coarse term."

"Also, you don't want her to kill you," Clint said.

 

Clint's Sleeping Beauty was tall, blonde and wearing a very distinctive uniform.

"Dear God." Tony felt he needed to sit down - preferably with a stiff drink. Or ten.

"What?" Clint looked puzzled. Puzzled! "You know this guy or something?"

"It's Cap." This was big. Bigger than he could have dreamt of. "Captain America." Also: likely to turn things very awkward, very quickly. "I mean, I knew SHIELD was looking for him, obviously, but, well, old news. I never guessed they'd actually _found_ him."

"Well. I suppose that explains the ice box," Natasha said.

"They got him out of the ice." It made sense. "Only they didn't know how to unfreeze him safely, so they didn't." That made sense, too. Except: "He doesn't look so bad for a guy who's been on ice for over sixty years. I mean, tuck him in a bed, you'd think he was just taking a nap."

"So ... we're going to do what, exactly? Wait for him to wake up? He feels kind of warm."

"Living warm, or running a fever warm?" Tony reached for Cap's forehead. "Why didn't you say something sooner?"

"Living warm, I think."

"Yeah. Guess that means he's going to wake up." Tony realized the thought was slightly terrifying. Or, fine, it was a lot terrifying. "Quick. You spend sixty years on ice - what's the first thing you want when you wake up?"

Clint smirked. Natasha rolled her eyes - at Clint's lack of maturity, Tony preferred to think.

"Something to drink. Food. A newspaper. People _not_ staring at you like you are their childhood crush slash hero."

Tony glared.

"Better," she said. "I will put together a light meal. Perhaps Clint might be able to find a recent newspaper."

"On it."

*

Tony Stark was an idiot with a surplus of a great many things.

At the same time, he was a genius who found a great many things missing from his life. In her more generous moods (usually when she hadn't actually talked to Tony for at least two weeks), Natasha might almost feel sorry for him.

"Milk?"

One of these days, Clint might severely regret sneaking up on her. "It's healthy."

"What's wrong with coffee? They had coffee in the forties, right?"

Tony owned a semi-intelligent coffee machine. It required being addressed by name and a request for coffee to be made in a friendly, polite sort of voice - unless you were Tony, in which case JARVIS would do those things for you. "Yes. Probably a bit different from what we drink today, but yes."

Clint shrugged. "Got yesterday's newspaper."

"Good doggie."

"Thank you, mistress. Want me to get your slippers next?"

"You'd probably chew on them."

Clint nodded amiably. Sometimes, Natasha wondered if anything anyone said or did to him ever affected Clint in any way. (And then she'd remember Budapest, and know that it did. He was just very good at hiding it - like she was.)

"Best we get back there before Tony does something he'll regret later."

"Somnophilia doesn't really seem his kind of thing."

"No, but I can picture him just fine in a nurse's costume, all ready to take care of some poor patient."

 

"His name is Steve," Tony said. He was not wearing any kind of nurse's uniform, but he was looking decidedly ... energized. Itching to run around and commit acts of stupidity. "He says I can call him Steve."

"Ma'am." Steve looked ... sensible, Natasha decided. Hungry, too.

"I brought you some food." She placed the tray on a table, noticing the way his eyes followed her - not like he was checking her out or anything, or, well, yes, _exactly_ like he was checking her out. For concealed weapons, that was.

"Has ... Tony told you anything about how you came to be here, Captain?" Unlikely.

On the other hand, the truth didn't exactly make for a very credible story. Plus, it was hardly likely to make Tony look good, which would also have been a consideration.

"He told me a lot of people have been looking for me for a long time. Miss ... ?"

"Natasha." There was no real reason not to give him her last name as well, really. "Romanov."

"Clint Barton," Clint said, nodding. Steve nodded back, his expression relaxing slightly.

With any luck, Tony wouldn't have noticed. "To make it quick: the war ended, your side won, life went on. You were found by some people who felt it better to keep you a secret - we found you and got you out of there." All true, strictly speaking.

"They were keeping you in a _crate_ ," Tony said. "It was horrible."

Steve looked at him. It was not an unfriendly look, but there was a certain ... understanding in it.

"I wasn't conscious, so I don't really remember anything," Steve said. "I'm happy to be up and about again, though, thanks. I'll try to be out of your hair as soon as possible."

"Stay!" Tony said. His hand made a grabbing motion, but thankfully, he didn't actually attempt to physically restrain Steve. "Um. I mean, stay as long as you like. My hair is your hair, and all that."

Clint coughed.

"My _house_ ," Tony said. "It was a joke, see? A play on words?"

"Thank you, Tony," Steve said. "That's very kind of you."

"I'm a very kind person. And I have a very big house."

 _This is all going to end in tears,_ Natasha thought, catching Clint's gaze.

He nodded at her once. _No doubt about it._


	2. The Tin Can Job

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Yes, I heard you say 'killer robots' the first time," Tony said.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the first chapter got translated into Russian (yay!) and thus, remembering I'd drafted a second one at some point happened.

"You want me to risk my life to steal a _what_?"

Clint didn't think he'd signed up for this kind of nonsense. Admittedly, he hadn't actually signed up for anything - it had been more of a 'well, we can either kill this guy or work for him and earn a lot of money' sort of thing, and at the time, Natasha hadn't seemed particularly inclined either way.

Thus, the decision had been Clint's.

Thus, Natasha's cool glance informed him, he had nobody to blame for the current situation but himself.

"A sketchbook," Tony said. "It's a book with sketches in it. Paper, shouldn't weigh more than - well, I forgot, but it's all there in the specs. I'm a very good researcher."

"Early forties," Natasha said.

"That's date, not weight. Sounds alike, considerably differences in spelling. And meaning."

Not her point, Clint figured. "It's _his_. Isn't it? Steve's."

Tony shrugged. "I thought it'd make a nice 'congratulations at having rejoined the living' two-month anniversary gift."

"For which you will pay me - " Well, okay, the price was fair enough.

"Don't I always?" Tony gestured expansively. "You do stuff, I pay you."

Clint considered. "Will this help you finally get to first base?"

*

"Yes, I heard you say 'killer robots' the first time," Tony said. "What I _asked_ was - "

Clint yelled something rude and entirely uncalled for. (At least in regards to Tony. And the killer robots probably - no, _definitely_ wouldn't have the necessary hm parts for it, unless they'd been created by a very twisted mind, which, given that they were killer robots, was actually a distinct possibility.)

All right. So Clint was yelling at killer robots, and Tony was having a problem, as well as a lot of unanswered questions.

"I should go in," Natasha said.

He also had one deadly assassin still up his sleeve. Unfortunately: "Can't."

Clint yelled something again - not rude, this time, just a 'being chased by killer robots and pissed off about it' yell, so Tony figured he was doing fine for now.

"Can," Natasha said.

"I'm sorry, who's the technical genius here: you or me? You go in, we'll get noticed. We get noticed, some very nasty people are going to show up. Clint can handle some killer robots. Aren't you guys supposed to be partners? What, you think he's going to let some walking tin cans get the better of him?"

Natasha smiled. Gorgeous redhead with a hot body smiling at him. It should be something he was used to, really; Tony got hot women smiling at him all the time - even if they weren't always redheads.

"Um," he said.

"One scratch on him and you're dead," Natasha said. Then she stopped smiling, which was sort of a relief, and got up and left the room, which shouldn't have been.

* 

_Stories,_ Natasha thought.

She and Clint were not entirely unknown, in some circles. It was what happened when you were good at your job and didn't get killed; the number of people who'd seen you in action and lived to tell about it gradually increased.

"Aim for the head!"

Captain America had been a hero. People had _made_ him into a hero, even before he actually was one. She'd seen the movies - because one could not spend prolonged periods of time with Tony and not, eventually, be exposed to something to do with Captain America.

Her expectations of the real thing hadn't been particularly high.

Clint grabbed one of his trick arrows (about a dozen left, she noticed, which might have meant trouble if there were more robots on the way) and fired it.

At the head, of course, because Captain America had just told him that was what he should be doing.

The robot exploded, sharp metal bits flying everywhere. Steve raised his shield and jumped in front of where Clint had been a fraction of a second ago (but wasn't, anymore, since he wasn't actually an idiot, most of the time).

"In or out?"

Clint grinned at her. He definitely had more than one scratch on him. "I actually already got the thing. So out, definitely."

Steve threw his shield like a boomerang and nearly decapitated another robot. If Natasha had been impressed by unsubtle acts of violence, she might have been impressed. As it was, she awarded herself some extra points for taking the time to collect the shield from Tony's workroom before getting Steve.

"Trap?" Most security measures were meant to keep people out in the first place, not stop them from getting out safely, after. It was good sense; better to stop a thief from stealing your painting in the first place, than shoot him on his way to the exit and risk getting blood on it.

"Maybe," Clint said. "Hey, Cap! Pack it in, we're leaving."

Steve turned. The expression on his face was ... happy, Natasha decided. A bit like Tony when he'd just gotten in a new toy. Something worth thinking about, once they'd gotten out of here.

"Which way?" His breathing was still steady, as if he'd just taken a stroll in the park. (Well, hers was, too. Clint's wasn't, but then, Clint had been on this job a good bit longer.)

Natasha tapped her com. "Tony?" He'd been whining at her for a solid fifteen minutes now, which she felt ought to be enough to get over it. "Anything useful you want to contribute?"

*

It had felt good to finally be _doing_ something again.

Tony was a great guy, obviously - he seemed to act a bit odd, sometimes, but Steve figured that was probably just a matter of time. He'd gotten used to a talking coffee machine; he'd get used to Tony.

"One coffee, please. Black, no sugar."

He'd gotten used to Clint and Natasha pretty well already. He _liked_ Clint and Natasha - enough not to ask any questions when Natasha had come knocking on the door to his room, tossed his old shield at him and told him to come along.

Clearly, anyone who kept an army of machines built to kill people wasn't one of the good guys.

"Steve?"

On the other hand, anyone who (deliberately?) went into a building where someone kept an army of machines built to kill people wasn't necessarily one of the good guys, either.

"Coffee done, Captain. Enjoy, and have a good day."

"Wow," Tony said. "He must be a fan."

Steve picked up his mug. "It's just because I said 'please'." He knew how computers worked, more or less. How they weren't _actually_ people, even if it was tempting to think of them that way sometimes. "If you say 'please', he'll do the same thing for you."

Tony's expression was dubious. "Maybe. Anyway, I just wanted to say thanks for saving the day. What you did back there was really ... well, it was really something."

Steve shrugged. "Natasha and Clint did a lot of the work, too."

"Yes, I'm sure. But, you know, work for them, heroic rescue for you."

"Work, huh?" Steve kept his tone carefully casual. "Must be some job."


End file.
